While Baltimore’s job base grew by 60 basis points year-over-year, the metro area would have lost 500 jobs without exceptionally strong performance from education and health services. Through the first half of 2017, the annual growth rate for the education and health services sector has hovered between 3 to 4 percent.
As job growth has tilted towards education and health services, Baltimore City has benefitted. The City gained 3,500 jobs over the past year, nearly on par with suburban growth of 4,400 jobs over the same period.
Mixed performance in office occupying sectors has coincided with reduced levels of occupancy growth. Professional and business services has rebounded and posted annual growth of 2.5% most recently, but that is still relatively slow compared to more robust growth seen earlier in the economic cycle. Despite employment losses in industrial occupying sectors, warehouse tenant demand has ramped upwards in recent quarters to record levels with mid-year net absorption at an all-time high of 3.7 million square feet. Demand from food & beverage, e-commerce and net new entrants to the market have aided the industrial demand.
